The Account of the Appendix - The Long Version

I woke up on Wednesday morning at 4am with stomach cramps. I had made chicken the night before and, since my cooking skills can still be a bit questionable, I thought maybe I hadn't cooked the chicken enough.

I got up that morning and still had some cramping but decided to take the girl out and tackle some hills with Lisa and Field. The exercise felt like it did me some good so when we got home, the Squirrel and I headed to the grocery.

As the day went on, the cramping started getting worse, started moving more into my pelvis and I started feeling sick to my stomach. I pulled out my handy dandy WebMD app and started checking out my symptoms when I came across appendicitis.

"The main symptom of appendicitis is belly pain. Many people feel the first pain near the belly button. Then it moves to the lower right side of the belly. You may also have a fever or feel sick to your stomach.

Sometimes the only symptom is a general feeling of not being well and a pain that is hard to describe. The pain in your belly may be different than any pain you have had before. It may be severe. Or it may not seem like a very strong pain, but you may have the feeling that something is wrong. Trust your instincts."

Ok. Hmmm. If it looks like and duck and sounds like a duck...

So I love husband. Very much. But we are VERY different when it comes to feeling sick. Jared has a runny nose and he can't get out of bed and is writhing in pain, unable to lift a finger. I don't like being sick so I just tend to ignore it. I let Jar know I was feeling a little off that morning. When I put the Squirrel down for a nap and was starting to feel worse, I decided to lay down myself and let him know it was getting a little worse. Jared had had a pretty busy morning and had wrapped everything up by about 3pm. The girl started waking up from her nap and the hubs came in to let me know he was going to go hit some golf balls.....really? Um, sure. Don't worry, I'll get the girl. So off he went, the girl got up fully rested from her nap and ready to play, and there I was, not really able to get off the couch from pain. Awesome.

Needless to say, when Jared got home an hour and a half later, I wasn't quite functioning. But as a mom, you do what you've gotta do, right? I let the hubs know I thought there was something seriously wrong. It was close to 5pm and I wouldn't have made it to the doctor in time so I decided to head to the Urgent Care. I love my mom because I'll never stop being her little girl. I called to let her know I was headed to get things checked out and she came straight over to take me so I wouldn't be alone. After seeing the nurse and the doctor for about 5 minutes at the Urgent Care, I was on my way to the ER. Now I probably should have just headed there right away but I hate the ER and was trying to avoid it at all costs.

So here's where it gets good. I walk in and they get me back pretty quickly. But as I'm standing there, this pregnant lady walks in right behind me. She's probably 35, slender and I'd guess about 6-7 months pregnant. She says to the lady at the desk that she's having some swelling in her belly and some pains.

Lady behind the desk: "So how far along are you?"

Pregnant lady: "What do you mean?

Lady behind the desk: "Are you pregnant?"

Pregnant lady: "Oh, no! I'm just having swelling."

Me to myself: "What?!?!?! Um, sister, that's not just bloating. Have you ever seen that show on TLC, I Didn't Know I Was Pregnant??? Where are the camera crews because this lady is the next star?"

I didn't see pregnant lady again but I did overhear the nurses talking about the patient that didn't know she was pregnant. I bet I can guess who that was.

So I get back into a room with two other beds. After being there for about an hour, a man who's nose looks like it exploded plops down in the bed next to me. I hear his graphic story about 5 times as he retold it to each doctor and nurse, including the words blood gushing, blood pouring, blood everywhere, accompanied by snorting and sniffing of said blood back up his nostrils. I thought that I was going to pass out and that my mom was going to hurl. Very long story short, dude had nose surgery on Monday. That day he was driving home, blacked out and ran his car into his neighbor's house. Got brought to the ER, found a hematoma in his nose, cut it out (hence the gushing blood), was leaving the ER, sneezed and, in his words, "torpedo shot the nose tampons out of his nose". Further gushing ensued and he now was my roommate. Awesome.

By 1am, I had an ultrasound and an MRI and was finally settled in a room. When it looked like I wouldn't be going anywhere soon, Jared and my mom switched duties and he spent the night up at Methodist with me.



Surgery took place at 11am on Thursday and after a long wait and a really bad nurse in recovery, I was settled back in my room minus an organ by 3pm.

We spent last night up at Methodist but just got back home and I plan on taking it easy the next few days.

So that's the long and lengthy account of the appendix. There's a little more to the story but we'll get in to that later.